Season 25 saw the start of a move to explore the Doctor's past; script editor Andrew Cartmel had felt that as more of the character's own history, together with the history of the Time Lords, had been revealed, some of the mystery about the Doctor had been lost. As a consequence he, together with writers Ben Aaronovitch and Marc Platt, began developing the seeds of a new backstory, which would be hinted at throughout the season, that suggested the Doctor to be more powerful than most people were aware of.[1] This concept eventually came to be known as the "Cartmel Masterplan".

5 October 1988 (1988-10-05)
12 October 1988
19 October 1988
26 October 1988

7H

5.5
5.8
5.1
5.0

68
69
70
72

The Doctor and Ace travel to London 1963, meeting Countermeasures, a team aimed at resolving threats, two rival fractions of Daleks after a powerful Time-Lord device known as the Hand of Omega, Davros, who wants to use the hand and a strange little girl from Coal Hill School.

On the planet, Terra Alpha, where happiness is compulsory and sadness is against the law, the Kandyman, under the supervision of Helena A, makes a stream of molten Candy that kills those who dare to disobey it.

The Doctor and Ace come across three rivals: the Cybermen, a 17th Century sorceress and a group of Nazis who are all hunting for a statue hidden in an asteroid which recently crash landed in Windsor wildlife park.

The entire season was broadcast from 5 October 1988 to 4 January 1989. Season twenty-five was originally supposed to have been broadcast in production order, with The Greatest Show in the Galaxy second. However, the expected start of the season on 7 September was delayed to 5 October because of BBC coverage of the Seoul Summer Olympics. Nathan-Turner still wanted to lead off the year with Remembrance of the Daleks and have episode one of the twenty-fifth anniversary story, Silver Nemesis, broadcast on 23 November – the actual date of Doctor Who's 25th anniversary. This left only three weeks in between the two serials. Consequently, the original season finale, The Happiness Patrol, was exchanged with The Greatest Show in the Galaxy.

^ abThe Region 2 and 4 releases of the Special Edition of Remembrance of the Daleks was originally only available as part of The Complete Davros Collection box set, but was later re-released on its own.